00:02Quite frankly, it's the decision we thought would happen.
00:05These laws were blatantly unconstitutional.
00:07The real disappointment here is we had a New South Wales government that, in the face of
00:10advice from the parliamentarians and civil society, pursued these laws.
00:15So it's been a waste of time and money to a certain degree, but it's a real celebration
00:19of civil society and what community can do, and the Black Caucus and the Palestine Action
00:24Group who ran the case really deserve our congratulations and thanks for when they fought for their
00:28stuff they fought for our democratic rights as well.
00:31Just remind us of what these laws had given police the power to do and what was the argument
00:36made in court against it?
00:37This was the laws that the police commissioner could basically declare an area where it was
00:43impermissible for there to be any authorised protest within it.
00:46So it's called the Form 1 system.
00:48Community groups would sort of organise and sign on to have a protest and negotiate with
00:51the police about how it would happen.
00:53These laws basically banned that ever happening and really was a restriction on assembly.
00:57It was argued in court essentially that there was no purpose.
01:01It wasn't a proper purpose.
01:02And these laws were also an impermissible burden on those democratic rights of political communication
01:09and assembly.
01:10And that's what the courts found, that both these things were true.
01:14That is, this was an impermissible burden and the government really didn't have the proper
01:18purpose in doing what they were doing.
01:20What does this decision mean for the criminal charges that were laid against some of the protesters?
01:24It's a really good question.
01:25And ultimately there's a complex legal framework of laws at the moment that mean that's still
01:30up in the fight.
01:30But I think really even from a principal position, these laws were the foundation for instance
01:35of the Herzog protests, you know, the banning of and the animosity between police and protests
01:40as a demonstration was based around these laws as well.
01:43So the legislative foundation for that environment, that really terrible climate that's been created,
01:48has completely fallen away from the government now.
01:50And I think that's time for them to really follow the heel of the civil society and withdraw
01:56these charges and minimise the prosecutions now.
01:58The New South Wales Premier, Chris Minns, has released a statement.
02:01He says that the government is disappointed by this decision, but it stands by the legislation
02:06that they were necessary in the aftermath of Australia's worst terrorist attack.
02:10What do you make of that argument?
02:11Well, I think it's nice for the Premier to confirm to his community that he is not listening
02:16to not only community, people in his own party and parliament, but also the Chief Justice
02:22and the rest of the Court of Appeals.
02:24So we have a Premier here that's quite frankly not listening to reason and needs to really
02:28start, I think quite frankly, taking a better account of his leadership and what he's doing.
02:33And there's also a cabinet that supported these.
02:36Budget estimates was just recently there.
02:38We had a lot of ministers, Sharpe, Harris, Dip, they all confirmed that there was a unanimous
02:43support in cabinet for these laws.
02:45So we have New South Wales Labor leadership at the moment that's quite frankly, completely
02:49missing on what is the strong constitutional basis of our democracy and our rights.
02:54And New South Wales deserves better.
02:56How do you expect that the New South Wales government will respond to this decision?
03:00Well, I hope the government will listen, but you've heard the Premier's comments there
03:04and we've seen his track record.
03:05He's passed unconstitutional law after unconstitutional law and despite advice, despite the track record,
03:11despite the waste of money in taking this to court, there's a very good chance he needs,
03:15he'll just keep passing them.
03:16So what we really need to do as a community is hold our members of parliament account and
03:20have them be communicated with, to be told that this won't be tolerated and him to step
03:25back from doing this sort of advocacy.
03:27We see.
03:28We see.
03:28.
03:29.
03:29.
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